Location within European Union and GermanyLocation within European Union and Germany Coordinates: 52°31′N 13°23′ECoordinates: 52°31′N 13°23′E

CountryGermany

Government

• Governing MayorMichael Müller (SPD)

• Governing partiesSPD / CDU

• Votes in Bundesrat4 (of 69)

Area

• City891.85 km2 (344.35 sq mi)

Elevation34 m (112 ft)

Population (December 2013)[1]

• City3,517,424

• Density3,900/km2 (10,000/sq mi)

DemonymBerliner

Time zoneCET (UTC+1)

• Summer (DST)CEST (UTC+2)

Postal code(s)10115–14199

Area code(s)030

ISO 3166 codeDE-BE

Vehicle registrationB[2]

GDP/ Nominal€109.2 billion (2013) [3]

NUTS RegionDE3

Websiteberlin.de

Berlin (/bərˈlɪn/; German pronunciation: [bɛɐ̯ˈliːn] ( listen)) is the
capital of Germany and one of the 16 states of Germany. With a
population of 3.5 million people,[4] Berlin is Germany's largest city.
It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most
populous urban area in the European Union.[5] Located in northeastern
Germany on the River Spree, it is the center of the Berlin-Brandenburg
Metropolitan Region, which has about 4.5 million residents from over
180 nations.[6][7][8][9] Due to its location in the European Plain,
Berlin is influenced by a temperate seasonal climate. Around one third
of the city's area is composed of forests, parks, gardens, rivers and
lakes.[10]

First documented in the 13th century, Berlin became the capital of the
Margraviate of Brandenburg (1417), the Kingdom of Prussia (1701–1918),
the German Empire (1871–1918), the Weimar Republic (1919–1933) and the
Third Reich (1933–1945).[11] Berlin in the 1920s was the third largest
municipality in the world.[12] After World War II, the city was
divided; East Berlin became the capital of East Germany while West
Berlin became a de facto West German exclave, surrounded by the Berlin
Wall (1961–1989).[13] Following German reunification in 1990, the city
was once more designated as the capital of all Germany, hosting 158
foreign embassies.[14]

Berlin is a world city of culture, politics, media, and
science.[15][16][17][18] Its economy is based on high-tech firms and
the service sector, encompassing a diverse range of creative
industries, research facilities, media corporations, and convention
venues.[19][20] Berlin serves as a continental hub for air and rail
traffic and has a highly complex public transportation network. The
metropolis is a popular tourist destination.[21] Significant
industries also include IT, pharmaceuticals, biomedical engineering,
clean tech, biotechnology, construction, and electronics.

Modern Berlin is home to renowned universities, orchestras, museums,
entertainment venues, and is host to many sporting events.[22] Its
urban setting has made it a sought-after location for international
film productions.[23] The city is well known for its festivals,
diverse architecture, nightlife, contemporary arts, and a high quality
of living.[24] Over the last decade Berlin has seen the upcoming of a
cosmopolitan entrepreneurial scene.[25]

20th to 21st centuries[edit]

Street, Berlin (1913) by Ernst Ludwig KirchnerAfter 1910 Berlin had become a fertile ground for the German
Expressionist movement. In fields such as architecture, painting and
cinema new forms of artistic styles were invented. At the end of World
War I in 1918, a republic was proclaimed by Philipp Scheidemann at the
Reichstag building. In 1920, the Greater Berlin Act incorporated
dozens of suburban cities, villages, and estates around Berlin into an
expanded city. The act increased the area of Berlin from 66 to 883 km2
(25 to 341 sq mi). The population almost doubled and Berlin had a
population of around four million. During the Weimar era, Berlin
underwent political unrest due to economic uncertainties, but also
became a renowned center of the Roaring Twenties. The metropolis
experienced its heyday as a major world capital and was known for its
leadership roles in science, the humanities, city planning, film,
higher education, government, and industries. Albert Einstein rose to
public prominence during his years in Berlin, being awarded the Nobel
Prize for Physics in 1921.

Berlin in ruins after World War II (Potsdamer Platz, 1945).In 1933, Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party came to power. NSDAP rule
effectively destroyed Berlin's Jewish community, which had numbered
160,000, representing one-third of all Jews in the country. Berlin's
Jewish population fell to about 80,000 as a result of emigration
between 1933 and 1939. After Kristallnacht in 1938, thousands of the
city's persecuted groups were imprisoned in the nearby Sachsenhausen
concentration camp or, starting in early 1943, were shipped to death
camps, such as Auschwitz.[39] During World War II, large parts of
Berlin were destroyed in the 1943–45 air raids and during the Battle
of Berlin. Around 125,000 civilians were killed.[40] After the end of
the war in Europe in 1945, Berlin received large numbers of refugees
from the Eastern provinces. The victorious powers divided the city
into four sectors, analogous to the occupation zones into which
Germany was divided. The sectors of the Western Allies (the United
States, the United Kingdom and France) formed West Berlin, while the
Soviet sector formed East Berlin.[41]

The Berlin Wall in 1986, painted on the western side. People crossing
the so-called "death strip" on the eastern side were at risk
of being shot.All four Allies shared administrative responsibilities for Berlin.
However, in 1948, when the Western Allies extended the currency reform
in the Western zones of Germany to the three western sectors of
Berlin, the Soviet Union imposed a blockade on the access routes to
and from West Berlin, which lay entirely inside Soviet-controlled
territory. The Berlin airlift, conducted by the three western Allies,
overcame this blockade by supplying food and other supplies to the
city from June 1948 to May 1949.[42] In 1949, the Federal Republic of
Germany was founded in West Germany and eventually included all of the
American, British, and French zones, excluding those three countries'
zones in Berlin, while the Marxist-Leninist German Democratic Republic
was proclaimed in East Germany. West Berlin officially remained an
occupied city, but it politically was aligned with the Federal
Republic of Germany despite West Berlin's geographic isolation.
Airline service to West Berlin was granted only to American, British,
and French airlines.

The fall of the Berlin Wall on 9 November 1989. On 3 October 1990,
the German reunification process was formally finished.The founding of the two German states increased Cold War tensions.
West Berlin was surrounded by East German territory, and East Germany
proclaimed the Eastern part as its capital, a move that was not
recognized by the western powers. East Berlin included most of the
historic center of the city. The West German government established
itself in Bonn.[43] In 1961, East Germany began the building of the
Berlin Wall between East and West Berlin, and events escalated to a
tank standoff at Checkpoint Charlie. West Berlin was now de facto a
part of West Germany with a unique legal status, while East Berlin was
de facto a part of East Germany. John F. Kennedy gave his "Ich
bin ein Berliner" – speech in 1963 underlining the US support for
the Western part of the city. Berlin was completely divided. Although
it was possible for Westerners to pass from one to the other side
through strictly controlled checkpoints, for most Easterners travel to
West Berlin or West Germany prohibited. In 1971, a Four-Power
agreement guaranteed access to and from West Berlin by car or train
through East Germany.[44]

In 1989, with the end of the Cold War and pressure from the East
German population, the Berlin Wall fell on 9 November and was
subsequently mostly demolished. Today, the East Side Gallery preserves
a large portion of the Wall. On 3 October 1990, the two parts of
Germany were reunified as the Federal Republic of Germany, and Berlin
again became the official German capital. In 1991, the German
Parliament, the Bundestag, voted to move the seat of the (West) German
capital from Bonn to Berlin, which was completed in 1999. Berlin's
2001 administrative reform merged several districts. The number of
boroughs was reduced from 23 to twelve. In 2006 the FIFA World Cup
Final was held in Berlin.

The Libeskind-designed Jewish Museum Berlin, to the left of the old
Kollegienhaus (before 2005).

Outside of the Jewish Museum viewThe Jewish Museum Berlin (Jüdisches Museum Berlin) is one of the
largest Jewish Museums in Europe. In three buildings, two of which are
new additions specifically built for the museum by architect Daniel
Libeskind, two millennia of German-Jewish history are on display in
the permanent exhibition as well as in various changing exhibitions.
German-Jewish history is documented in the collections, the library
and the archive, in the computer terminals at the museum's Rafael Roth
Learning Center, and is reflected in the museum's program of events.
The museum was opened in 2001 and is one of Berlin’s most frequented
museums (almost 720,000 visitors in 2012).[1]

Opposite the building ensemble, the Academy of the Jewish Museum
Berlin was built – also after a design by Libeskind – in 2011/2012 in
the former flower market hall. The archives, library, museum education
department, and a lecture hall can all be found in the academy.[2]

Princeton economist W. Michael Blumenthal, who was born in Oranienburg
near Berlin and was later President Jimmy Carter's Secretary of the
Treasury, has been the director of the museum since December 1997.[3]